Big trip to the BIg Apple! ~ Free beauty tips

Last week I was in NYC to celebrate my mates birthdays (the Lee sisters). We spent most of our time eating delicious food and partying.

Me being a make up fiend, I had to get my beauty fix, so while the Lee's caught up with beauty sleep, I spent my spare hours in Sephora, Bloomingdales, Duane Reed and everywhere in between that sells beauty products.

I wish our pharmacies were more beauty focused like the USA and the rest of Europe, there are the odd few (a cool pharmacy on Great Portland Street) which sell NUXE and ART DECO but the majority are just so boring!

I also prefer the sales assistants on make up counters/pharmacies abroad, they are so friendly, full of knowledge and passionate about the industry they are working in (they remind me of me when I used to work in make up). I find that a lot of counter staff over here can be rude, judgmental and they definitely lack overall beauty and product knowledge (have found this on MAC counters and this kills me to say, but also a lot of Space.NK's, whereas the girls in Space.NK in NY were superb!!). The staff in Space.NK where I live are clueless, they are so clueless that I have even enquired about part time in-store work with them because I feel like the store will eventually close down because they don't appear to be making any money.

Do you guys prefer to buy your make up online or in-store? While you think about it, check out the highlights of my NYC trip in pictures.